Tea Gone Cold
by yamimitsukai
Summary: Taken from a prompt: Naomi orders Castiel to attack Crowley and some fluffy shenanigans ensue. A bit of Crowstiel.


**So there was this prompt that I saw on tumblr about how someone wanted something with Naomi ordering Castiel to kill Crowley…and I kind of got inspired to write this. My heart hurts, actually. **

Castiel was crying. Crowley was standing in the shadows behind the angel, out of range of his 'demon radar' watching the trench coat clad angel silently weep over the body of his fallen brother, Samandriel. Well, the _vessel_ wasn't sobbing. It was the angel who resided in the human meat puppet that was. Crowley had been with Castiel long enough in their partnership to recognize the little tell tale signs of his distress.

But the time when Crowley could simply appear at Cas' shoulder, tea or any strong drink in hand and share the cup was past. They had each made their choices and it just so happened that they jumped on different trains with them.

Crowley turned on his heel and flew; leaving Cas with the Winchesters, the only beings that would have more blood on their hands.

It was hours later, when Crowley was busy looking over a few reports from downstairs, that he felt an intruder try and force themselves through his wards. He pushed his chair back a bit, his pen dancing around on his fingers as he waited to see if his unwelcome houseguest would leave.

Several minutes passed and Crowley was refraining from grimacing in discomfort as the angel outside his house started shrieking loudly in frustration on some mental radio wave length at its inability to rip through his carefully placed wards. With a sigh, Crowley stood, dusting off any bits of dust that may have gathered on his jacket, and walked casually to his front door.

"You know, most people simply ring the doorbell, darling." Naomi glared at him, a hand running through her hair to make sure every strand was in place.

"I don't have time for your little jokes, Crowley. We need to talk now." She seethed. Crowley leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest.

"So start talking, mama beaver." Naomi's glare intensified, a static feeling of angelic grace rising exponentially. The King of Hell just gave her a bland look, the knowledge that he was protected by the angel wards that he now put up nearly everywhere he stayed.

"You're being a terrible host by not inviting me inside, Crowley." She hissed.

"I would rather think that I'm being a smart host by keeping my flat limited to just one megalomaniac, actually. Now, what did you want to talk about?"

"What did Samandriel tell you?"

Crowley scoffed. "Is that what this is about? The fact that your little angel working on minimum wage decided to spill the beans about a tablet that I already knew existed?"

"The existence of the Angel Tablet is to remain a secret from everybody! Only a select few angels are permitted to know consciously about it!"

"Don't mistake me for one of your stupid henchmen, poodle face. If there was going to be a Leviathan and a demon tablet, then there had to be an angel one. Now what exactly did you want by coming here?"

"To make you forget. The angel tablet has to remain a secret."

Crowley's eyes narrowed. That didn't make any…..

"It's not the angel tablet you want me to forget; it's something else." Naomi, from the few meetings they had with each other – a demon in his position gets some very interesting visitors- and the information he had managed to piece together from his sources (other angels) worked high enough in the hierarchy of heaven that the fact that she had come down herself to deal, or at least a projection of herself, with him meant that something big was happening Upstairs.

Crowley blinked, bits and pieces falling into place in the puzzle that Naomi had unwillingly handed to him.

"There aren't many angels left, are there?" The sudden stillness of the psycho angel in front of him confirmed his hypothesis. "Little Cassie managed to wipe out the majority of them, didn't he? And your forces were already pretty depleted from that little apocalyptic stunt a few years past."

"Shut up. You know nothing."

"Oh, but I think I'm on to something here. You don't have enough angels protecting heaven. I could launch an attack with half of my forces and it would be a cake walk massacring the few feather brains you have left." Crowley took a step back to pace in the slightly larger space the hallway granted him than the doorframe. He always thought better while moving. "You're using the little puppy to get the demon tablet so you can have a defense against _me_." Crowley laughed. Oh, this was brilliant. Naomi's face twisted into a mask of rage, a hint of the devastating haunting brilliance of the angel within the human puppet morphing the human features into something hideous. A scream of pure anger, a sound no human could make with their vocal chords, ripped from the woman's throat. She gestured sharply, and a child of maybe six or seven stepped out from the bushes that scattered his front yard, eyes blank and some sort of syringe in hand. The child made no sound as it suddenly moved faster than it should have been able, raising the needle as high as it could to try and stab Crowley with it. Within a few seconds, Crowley's hands were wrapped around the child's neck, avoiding the jabs that the midget continued to try to connect.

There was a loud snap as Crowley swiftly twisted the neck hard enough to break and the child fell limp in his arms. With a snort, he threw the body towards the silently fuming angel.

"Mind controlling little ants now? Oh how the mighty have fallen."

"I'll do what I have to." Naomi spat out and disappeared. There was no flutter of wings, just an empty space where she used to be. Crowley stared the spot for a few seconds longer, his eyes then traveling to where the child lay deadly still. With a sigh and a wave of his hand a fire sprouted up around the body and swiftly consumed it within its flames. He stepped back into his current residence once the flames were doused, running his hand through his short hair. The question now was, what to… Crowley stilled as he felt a breeze blow across his face. He had just closed the door and never had any windows opened. With a curse he walked briskly to the kitchen where the back door had been violently kicked open. There was a scuffle behind him and he turned to see a teenager holding a can of spray paint, blank glazed eyes, a syringe in the other hand and worst of all, mud on his boots. Crowley twitched and with a snap of his fingers, found himself with another dead body on his property. Fantastic.

Growling under his breath, Crowley searched throughout his house and found his angel sigils crossed over with graffiti making them null and void.

"Shit." He cursed, rushing to pick the bottle up and redraw those stupid symbols all over again.

A flutter of wings right in front of him stopped Crowley short. Castiel stood in front of him, disheveled and looking confused.

"I- what? I don't understand. What's going on?"

"Well, I got to say you're looking good for a guy who just murdered his own brother." Crowley snorted, forcing himself to drop the spray paint. It wouldn't do anything at this point. "But then I suppose you must be used to that by now."

Castiel looked close to tears.

"But, I didn't … I didn't want to, I don't know what's going on, why am I here? Why are you here?"

"I live here, git. The least you could do before dropping by is at least know who's house you're going to."

"But why am I- I cannot kill you outright just yet. But subduing you is what is best in this situation." Castiel's face had gone impassive, his words monotone. Crowley stared.

"Sorry, what? Care to repeat that?"

"Due to the circumstances, killing you is unfavorable—no stop—but demons are close enough to angels, so this method should work as well. Stop!" Castiel's voice fluctuated between sounding like a fax machine and a terrified six year old. Crowley had been watching the angel closely, noticing how his eyes seemed to go from a fearful puppy to dead with every small pause.

"Better the enemy you know, than the one you don't, am I right, Naomi?" Crowley could feel anger bubbling up inside of his chest; at least when he tortured someone, he did it face to face and let them know what he was doing and not from a distance who knows how far away, controlling their actions so they didn't even remember anything. And people thought demons were bad.

Castiel was blinking looking around in confusion, one of his hands reaching into his trench coat pocket and pulling out a syringe. Just how many of those things was the bitch handing out?

"So that's how you get people to kneel in front of you? Inject them with whatever that is and then you can have them dance a tango for your pleasure up in your little office? What a lovely weapon Heaven has at its disposal."

"Crowley, what is—no!" Cas dropped the syringe and it rolled a few feet away, his hands shaking as he took several large steps back into the wall, trying to curl into himself to make a small target. "No, no, no, no, no, I don't want to. You can't—Shut up!" Crowley watched fascinated as the demeanors of Castiel did constant 180s, from angry to horrified, a warrior of heaven to a child scared by the monsters under their bed.

Crowley wondered what was going through his mind.

As Castiel fought internally with himself, Crowley swiftly walked towards the syringe, picking it up and pocketing it. He would have to examine the contents of it later.

"No, stop! –It's for the good of heaven, you wanted to redeem yourself didn't you? -Not like this! I don't want to! – You have to, Castiel!" Blood was leaking from a spot near Castiel's eye, dripping down his cheek. Naomi wasn't even trying to subtly manipulate the angel; desperation had her full on trying to force the rebellious angel into following her orders. Crowley thought it might be wise to put some distance between himself and the train wreck that the angel had become. The shouting was increasing in volume as he flew out of his house, some of the shrieks reaching intolerable decibels. He could almost see the frame of his house start to shake.

As soon as he stepped outside, - he had the proper sense to be wearing shoes even while inside his house- Crowley felt a large quake of angelic energy centered at his house, spread quickly and viciously through the air. He gritted his teeth as he felt a small burning in the middle of his chest, quickly trying to pull up all of the power he had with the human souls to protect himself from being burned from the inside out.

The attack didn't last long, a few seconds at the most, but Crowley was uneasy by the sudden quietness that pressed around him. Rubbing his chest, he walked cautiously back to his residence, keeping his senses open for an hostile angel. He didn't live this long by being stupid.

Sobbing reached his ears as he passed by the living room, and Crowley peeked through the doorway to see Cas sitting on the floor, head buried in his knees and shoulders shaking. Silently, Crowley left the room to the kitchen and came back a few minutes later with a steaming mug in his hands.

"You're lucky I still had a packet of your favorite Jasmine tea left, feather brains." Crowley muttered as he crouched, holding out the mug. Castiel looked up, the blood from under his eye mixed with the salty trail of tears down his cheek making a long red streak.

"I don't want kill anyone anymore, Crowley." The demon picked up one of the angel's hands, wrapping it around the mug.

"I'm not wasting my time to get you to feel better about yourself, Cas. Quit your waterworks, drink your damm tea and then go sing your problems out to someone who would actually care. Like your boyfriends." Castiel struggled to stop his weeping, his hands wrapped around the mug tightly.

"Crowley, I… What am I doing here?" he said a few minutes later as his breathing got back to normal.

"You mean besides sitting on my floor and letting your tea that I went through all that effort to make for you go cold?" Crowley by this point was sitting by Castiel, his back resting against the wall, legs stretched out in front of him, fingers playing with his phone.

"Yes. Why was I brought back? I needed to be in Purgatory, atoning for my sins, not back on Earth killing more of my siblings!" Crowley rubbed his ears in annoyance. He was going end up deaf by the end of today if all these angels kept shouting. One would think the concept of an inside voice would be known to them.

"Look, I'm not your friend. We burned that bridge already, and there is no chance of it rebuilding itself. So drink your god-forsaken tea and then get out of my house and talk this out with someone who cares. Which is not me!"

Castiel quieted, looking down at his cup of tea. "I apologize. I didn't—"  
Crowley waved his hand to shut him up. "Yeah, I already know all of this. Just-take your mug and get going. You have other people to see."

"But this is the mug that you—"

"Just get your feathery arse out of the door, you sodding git!" Crowley roared. He didn't bother to turn when he heard a small "Fine," and the sound of rustling wings.

Crowley waited a few minutes before bothering to look, and he sighed when he saw cup of half drunk tea sitting in the spot where Castiel had been. Picking it up, his fingers grazed the engravings of text on the ceramic, something he had done numerous times before.

_I don't know what sort of message the King of Hell needs on his teacup._ Crowley scoffed and pulled himself up to his feet, taking the mug to the sink where he would wash it and then place it on its spot by the matching mug.

_Consider this your inspiration message of the day, Feathers._

**I didn't mean to make this so depressing. And yeah, I just kind of needed a bullshit reason for Naomi, so I just made up this something or the other. **


End file.
